LeBron James brought two championships to Miami, but signing him in 2010 wasn’t the most important move that Pat Riley has made as Heat president, according to Riley himself. Instead, Riley says that the biggest acquisition in Heat history was the trade for Shaquille O’Neal in 2004, which “gave us real legitimacy.” The South Florida Sun-Sentinel’s Ira Winderman has the story in advance of O’Neal’s Hall of Fame enshrinement on Friday…
This is not, Pat Riley stresses, revisionist history. And it also is not, he insists, getting caught up in the moment that will have Shaquille O’Neal this coming Friday becoming the third former Miami Heat player to enter the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
“I’ll say this, and I mean this,” Riley says during a relaxed moment this past week, “Shaq’s acquisition was bigger than any acquisition that we ever made, including the Big Three.”
Bigger than LeBron James. Bigger than Chris Bosh. And bigger, Riley says, than the player who helped Riley turn around the franchise around upon their dual arrivals in 1995, Alonzo Mourning.
“Zo was big,” Riley says, “but getting Shaquille changed everything for our franchise.”
